It's not quite the same as cows, chickens and pigs. Shark populations are rapidly being decimated right now because of the demand for shark fin soup. They are a vital part of the ecosystem and without them our oceans are in serious trouble.

It is exactly the same as cows, chickens and pigs. The only difference is that humans are literally manufacturing cows, chickens and pigs. They are all living beings and just as important. All this for human taste buds.

it is the manufacturing that makes the difference. i could imagine that if sharks were able to be manufactured, we wouldn't have the issue of this particular decimation of the population and the ecosystem to boot.

of course, we would have *other* problems, that all kinds of agriculture (eg, including the manufacture of plants) create — it does *massively* affect ecosystems.

the farming that seems to work well — mixed organic/permaculture pastoralism and agriculture. Polyface farm is a good example — among many others. Many biodynamic farms do a great job as well with protecting as much local diversity as well as a diverse production of foodstuffs.

If we didn't eat them there would be no cows, pigs sheep etc…. and yes people could use them for other reasons. milk wool etc…. but milk is bad for humans and hey it's all exploitation of animals right? I suppose some people would keep them as pets? But then they would suffer the same issues of specialised breeding that make most breed of pedigree dogs suffer!
So really if we stop "exploiting" farmed animals… they will become extinct!